Death by 1000 Cuts

A client of mine said a very interesting thing a while back, and really, I can’t get it out of my head. Her words seemed to sum up the words of so many.

As our session came to an end, she said, “I thought this work (inner, emotional work) was about unpacking the big traumatic events of my life. How can something so little as feeling like I didn’t belong in junior high be what’s causing me so much pain?”

I sat for a minute, not because I was stumped, but because I hear this so often. So many women sit on my sofa, and at the beginning, tell me that they aren’t sure what they are doing here (in my office). Nothing BAD has ever happened to them, but they just feel stuck.

I like to ask what that “bad thing” would be, and usually I hear big scary things that we seem to be collectively frightened of… horrible childhoods, terrible acts of violence, rape, deaths, etc. All the super bad things we tend to project how “I just don’t know what I’d do if that happen to me”. The interesting thing is, I see women who HAVE been through some of these horrible things, and women who have not. And what I have noticed is that it is not always the BIG THING that causes us the most stress. The BIG THING isn’t necessarily what creates the toughest road blocks to living our life.

Sometimes the biggest thing standing in our way was once a tiny paper cut we never allowed to heal. Just kept picking at it. Some mean girl in 5th grade told us our laugh was stupid and sounded like a hyena, which caused us to stop laughing. And in that moment our 10 year old self decided into our future to keep laughing to a minimum. And then, over the years, we became fearful of having fun because we might laugh, and that would be, well, just as embarrassing as it was in 5th grade.

This is where the separation from self begins.

Separation from self is the beginning of anxiety, anger, pain, depression, etc. The list goes on and on.

So now, think about how many times you’ve felt less than, like you don’t fit in, were made fun of, or like you shrunk to make someone else happy. How many paper cuts is that? How many times have you “picked” at that cut by continuing to conform, to not be your true self out of fear?

Can you see how separation from yourself can grow exponentially?

The scariest thing, I think, is how EASILY we do this to ourselves. Skim over these paper cuts.

What if we learned how to heal the paper cuts WHEN THEY HAPPENED?

That is what I do. I teach tools to help you work through triggers as they happen.

And now, beginning May 3rd, I will be hosting Rewired Life Radio where I talk with other women about their tools and perspectives on how to Love. Heal. Celebrate.{Learn More}